"Save him! Strikes me, Miriam, you've gone through your life looking upon yourself as a sort of human rocket apparatus. You can't save people against their wills, my dear; and some of 'em won't be saved. Look at Shorty--and that Gerald Arkel is a pig if ever there was one. He prefers his own dunghill--that's vulgar perhaps, my dear, but it's expressive, and that's the great thing! Anyhow, I do hope you've got over all that sort of thing now, Miriam, because I have news of the scamp." "News of Gerald?--Oh, Mrs. Parsley, he is not ill--not dead?" The old lady snorted. "Dead. No, my dear, 'naught was never in danger.' He's alive and sinning. But he's alone! Hilda has left him!" "Hilda--left--Gerald?" "Yes; is it so utterly impossible? Come, my dear, I don't deny he's good looking, but there _are_ other men in the world you know. They've been going it properly, I can tell you. The Manor House is mortgaged--that I could have told you three months ago; in fact, now she's spent his money for him, he has ceased to be so far as she is concerned, and she hasn't lost much time in nominating his successor either--she's gone off with an American millionaire. What d'you think of that? They're in Florence, I believe." "Poor Gerald," she said slowly. "He has reaped his whirlwind." "And why not; he sowed it, goodness knows. You don't mean to tell me you pity him? There!--I do believe I'm right, you--no!--you wouldn't go to the fellow now?" "Only if he were ill--if he were dying would I go to him. When he left me that night in this very room, I told him when I saw him again it would be on his death-bed. When the end comes I shall be there." Mrs. Parsley rose and kissed her. She could not but admire deep down in her soul the unswerving steadfastness of this woman. It touched her more than anything in life had touched her for years past; for she had a very tender heart had Mrs. Parsley. "You are a silly fool, my dear," she said, "a great big silly donkey. We are both silly donkeys, I believe, when it comes to the point. But after the way that man's insulted you--well, most women would have liked to dance a polka on his grave." "You wouldn't--if he had been _your_ husband." "P'r'aps not--but although I said I was a donkey, not in my most asinine moments would I have gone as far as that. Gerald Arkel should never have been _my_ husband. And if he had, that hussy would never have got him--that I swear! But you, dear, you've just been soft soap in their hands; you're so good-natured and gentle and sweet, that I could--but there, I love you for it all the more." So saying, Mrs. Parsley expressed her affection in a warm embrace, and seeing it was hurtful to her friend, changed the subject.